


Magnetic North

by st_aurafina



Category: The Authority, X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Challenge Response, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-11
Updated: 2008-10-11
Packaged: 2017-10-04 11:40:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/st_aurafina/pseuds/st_aurafina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Between one assignment and the next, Weapon X and Weapon M find another way forward.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Magnetic North

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 2008 DC Marvelthon, for the prompt "Logan/Midnighter, what they do isn't very nice."

What they do isn't very nice, but it eats up the time between assignments. The gaps left by the constant skillset augmentations and memory implants make conversation disjointed. When the ordnance is clean and stowed and the dead-drops are ready, the silences between their brief exchanges become longer. Far better for Logan to slide one hand along the other man's jaw line, and pull him down to meet his own mouth. They trail clothes bloodied by the work all the way to the shower in the cheap hotel, and fuck languidly under tepid rusty water. In the morning, there's a new contact, a new target and a new assignment. Weapon X and Weapon M. Nothing changes. Why would it?

The next target is a scientist. They aren't given specifics, just a directive to make it messy. Logan understands – a message is to be sent via their actions. While the man screams, Logan wonders - in the part of his mind that the conditioning programs have failed to penetrate - whether it would comfort the target to know that Logan doesn't enjoy what he's doing. It would be worse for the man, surely, if it had been one of the other operatives that Logan has worked with; the ones who take pleasure in causing pain. The train of thought is interrupted by a single retort: his partner has put a bullet into the base of the scientist's skull. Logan frowns. This contravenes orders.

"There's no point." Weapon M turns, holsters his weapon, strips off his latex gloves and balls them in his pocket and walks out of the warehouse without looking back. Logan follows, slipping into routine while he processes the idea. He can't remember if he's ever flouted orders before, but he doubts that it will be well-received. As he taps the "end of assignment" code into the disposable cellphone, he feels more and more certain that he prefers to avoid excessive enthusiasm in this kind of work. He can't remember specifics, but it feels wrong to enjoy causing pain. Once thought, the concept sits comfortably in his mind. It's disorienting at first, to adhere to two contradictory codes of behaviour, but the cognitive double vision soon settles.

When it comes time to check in, Logan stands beside his partner, their backs parade-ground straight in front of the expressionless man in mirror shades, and he confirms Weapon M's impassive report. "Subject was shot while trying to escape." He sets his mouth in the same straight line as his partner's, lets his gaze rest on the wall beyond the suit's shoulder. He prays that the man isn't carrying biometric equipment, because Logan can practically see his own shirt quiver with the force of his heartbeat. The suit looks them both over and nods, then hands them a heavy folder: it's a new target, a new assignment and no more questions.

They drive to the next motel. Logan shreds the other man's t-shirt barely inside the door, pushes him against the wall, works up and down the man's neck with his mouth and teeth. Rebellion is heady stuff: they tussle on the bed for hours. When Logan wakes, there is an arm thrown over his chest, and warm breath against his shoulder. He closes his eyes again, lost in the memory of that moment when he chose to disobey.

***

On the way to the next job, Logan reaches across from the passenger seat and yanks the wheel hard right, onto the shoulder. His partner swears and works the brake like a dancer so that the car slews in beside the diner instead of through the window. Logan is out of the car before the tires have stopped squealing. Four strides to the diner door, three to the counter, and one more to plant a fist in the face of the man with the sawed-off shotgun. The waitress cries, the chef peers over the serving shelf, and the burly patron hiding under his table stops dialling on his cell phone, staring with an open mouth. Logan drags the thug by one boot across the clean linoleum floor and over the threshold with a few sharp tugs. The dumpster will hold him until the cops can make it out here.

His partner looks at him with raised eyebrows.

"Bathroom break." Logan settles back into the passenger seat, and tilts his hat over his eyes with quiet satisfaction.

Weapon M slams the car back into gear. "Next time, get pie."

***

It all comes together with the next assignment: a transport job. As they bundle the bound man into the trunk, Logan plays the orders through his mind looking for a point of intersection with his new way of thinking. The prisoner closes his eyes as Weapon M slams the trunk closed. At the last moment, Logan jams his fingers under the lid, and hoists it open again, shaking his hand as the crushed flesh pulls back together.

Weapon M looks at him with raised eyebrows, silently holding out the keys to the trunk.

Logan shakes his head, there's something he wants his partner to understand, something for which he can't find words. He rips the tape from the prisoner's mouth, and pulls him halfway out of the trunk. "What do they want with you? What's so important about your life that they send us to drag you away?"

Weapon M looks back and forth between the two of them, and understanding spreads across his face. Logan nods with him: these are real people. We don't have to kill them. Maybe we can help them. Maybe they can help us.

The man gibbers at them through tears and snot, and tells them about the project he had been leading. Weapon X and Weapon M listen carefully, questioning him to draw out more of the details. Logan doesn't recognise all the scientific terms, but his well-programmed mind finds pictures to match the words: tanks, cultures, tissue grafts, soldiers. He pulls his partner aside to confer.

"Can't let him go." Weapon M flexes his hand, an effortless gesture that Logan knows will separate vertebra with a snap.

Logan shakes his head. "There's no point – if we take this place out,it's not going to matter if he squeals.We can't ever go back."

Weapon M's face is alight with the idea."This will hurt them."

Logan cups a hand against his partner's cheek. "This will set us free."

***

They watch the compound burn to the ground from the top of the canyon. Logan sits cross-legged on the hood of the car while his partner, bespeckled with ashes, prowls up and down along the cliff edge. When the flames have died, and only the faint glow of persistent embers give away the location of the fire, Logan catches his partner's arm. "We should move on."

Weapon M leans a hip on the fender and bends over him, kissing him hard with a mouth that tastes like cinder and old matches. "There's a man, Bendix. I've heard he wants to make a better world. Could be a good place for us, we could do more of this." He gestures towards the black smear in the desert.

Logan leans back against the windshield, the glass warm against his back. He tries to imagine what life would be like without the constant rhythm of assignments, implants, augmentations. White ash flutters down on his eyelashes, and for moment he tastes spruce and remembers the crunch of his foot breaking the crust on a snow bank. North tugs at his metal bones like a lodestone, and he presses a hand against his partner's chest to steady himself. "Reckon I'll head north, see what I can remember."

His partner nods and steps back, but Logan recognises that impassive mask. He locks their forearms together and pulls the man close. "My name's Logan." Despite all they've done together, it's the first time he's said his name aloud. He can almost, almost remember the sound of his name in other people's voices. The pull northwards strengthens.

Weapon M opens his mouth to reply, trips on the first syllable, then licks his lips. It's the closest thing to distress that Logan has ever seen him display. He presses a hand against his partner's mouth to stop him reaching for the name he can't remember. "Don't need to know your name to know who you are. Come find me some time." Logan turns towards the desert. The highway was only a few dozen miles away; he would walk through the night.


End file.
